Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

1 Car cam spot : DASH

Back in the 1800s, “dashboard” was the name given to a board placed at the front of a carriage to stop mud from “dashing” against the passengers in the carriage, mud that was kicked up by the hoofs of the horses. Quite interesting …

5 Sacred Judaic scroll : TORAH

The Torah, the first five books of the Hebrew Bible, are traditionally believed to have been written by Moses. As such, they are sometimes referred to as the Law of Moses, or Mosaic Law.

16 Pop in a bottle : COLA

The first cola drink to become a commercial success was Coca-Cola, soon after it was invented by a druggist in 1886. That original Coca-Cola was flavored mainly with kola nuts and vanilla. The formulation was based on an alcoholic drink called Coca Wine that had been on sale for over twenty years.

17 *Ingratiate oneself (with) : CURRY FAVOR (giving “party favor”)

To curry is to seek, at least when it is used in the phrase “to curry favor”.

28 Latin American dances : TANGOS

The dramatic dance called the tango originated in the late 1800s in the area along the border between Argentina and Uruguay. Dancers and orchestras from Buenos Aires in particular traveled to Europe and beyond in the early twentieth century and brought the tango with them. The tango craze first struck Europe in Paris in the 1910s, and from there spread to London and Berlin, crossing the Atlantic to New York in 1913.

33 “__ light is not daylight”: Juliet : YON

William Shakespeare’s “Romeo and Juliet” doesn’t end well for the title characters. Juliet takes a potion as a ruse to fool her parents, to trick them into thinking she is dead. The potion puts her in a death-like coma for 24 hours, after which Juliet plans to awaken and run off with Romeo. Juliet’s sends a message to Romeo apprising him of the plan, but the message fails to arrive. Romeo hears of Juliet’s “death”, and grief-stricken he takes his own life by drinking poison. Juliet awakens from the coma, only to find her lover dead beside her. She picks up a dagger and commits suicide. And nobody lives happily ever after …

35 Good name for a cook : STU

“Stu” sounds like “stew”.

38 Sun. speech : SER

Our word “sermon” comes from the Latin “sermonem” meaning “discourse, talk”. The literal translation of “sermonem” is “a stringing together of words”, from the Latin “serere” meaning “to join”, as in the related word “series”.

43 Armenian’s neighbor : IRANI

Armenia is a landlocked country found east of Turkey, and is a former Soviet Socialist Republic (SSR). Back in the year 301 CE, the ancient Kingdom of Armenia became the first nation in the world to adopt Christianity as its national religion.

48 Type of pie popular in Southern cuisine : PECAN

The pecan is the state nut of Alabama, Arkansas and California. Also, the pecan is the state tree of Texas.

52 Lecherous sorts : ROUES

“Roue” is a lovely word, I think, but one used to describe a less than lovely man, someone of loose morals. “Roue” comes from the French word “rouer” meaning “to break on a wheel”. This describes the ancient form of capital punishment where a poor soul was lashed to a wheel and then beaten to death with cudgels and bars. I guess the suggestion is that a roue, with his loose morals, deserves such a punishment.

60 Brahms played it : PIANO

Johannes Brahms was a leading German composer during the Romantic period. Brahms is one of the “Three Bs”, often grouped with Johann Sebastian Bach and Ludwig van Beethoven.

61 Element with the symbol “Fe” : IRON

The Latin word for “iron” is “ferrum”, which gives us “Fe” as the metal’s chemical symbol.

62 Mister Rogers : FRED

The “Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood” TV show starred Fred Rogers. It was the second-longest running series on PBS television after that other iconic children’s show “Sesame Street”.

64 Part of DVD : DISC

The abbreviation “DVD” doesn’t actually stand for anything these days, although it was originally short for “digital video disk”. The use of the word “video” was dropped as DVDs started to be used for storing a lot more than video. As a result, some folks assign the phrase “digital versatile disk” to “DVD”.

Down

1 Brew for an early night : DECAF

The first successful process for removing caffeine from coffee involved steaming the beans in salt water, and then extracting the caffeine using benzene (a potent carcinogen) as a solvent. Coffee processed this way was sold as Sanka here in the US. There are other processes used these days, and let’s hope they are safer …

2 High-end Honda : ACURA

Acura is the luxury brand of the Honda Motor Company. As an aside, Infiniti is the equivalent luxury brand for the Nissan Motor Company, and Lexus is the more luxurious version of Toyota’s models.

3 Princess Fiona’s love : SHREK

Princess Fiona is the title character’s love interest in the “Shrek” series of films.

4 Charlotte NBA team : HORNETS

The Hornets are the NBA team based in Charlotte, North Carolina. The Hornets were established as an expansion team in Charlotte in 1988, but moved and became the New Orleans Hornets in 2002. The NBA returned to North Carolina in 2004 with the establishment of the Charlotte Bobcats. The New Orleans franchise rebranded itself in 2013, becoming the Pelicans. As a result, the Charlotte Bobcats were able to change their name to the Hornets in 2014.

6 Mama bear, in Madrid : OSA

Madrid is the largest city in Spain, and is the nation’s capital. Madrid is located very close to the geographical center of the country. It is the third-largest city in the European Union (after London and Paris). People from Madrid called themselves Madrileños.

9 Falcon-headed son of Osiris : HORUS

Horus was one of the oldest gods in Ancient Egyptian religion. Usually, Horus was depicted as a falcon or a man with a falcon head. The Eye of Horus was a common symbol used in Ancient Egypt, a symbol of protection and royal power.

Osiris was the Egyptian god of the underworld. Osiris was the son of Geb the Earth god, and Nut the sky goddess. His wife Isis was also his sister. Osiris was killed and mutilated by Set, his own brother. Isis reassembled Osiris and revived him, just long enough that they could conceive their son Horus.

11 Name in Japanese WWII propaganda : TOKYO ROSE

“Tokyo Rose” was the nickname given to several English-speaking female propaganda broadcasters who supported the Japanese cause during WWII. The person most associated with “Tokyo Rose” was Iva Toguri D’Aquino, an American citizen from Los Angeles who earned a degree in zoology from the University of California. Toguri travelled to Japan in mid-1941, and got stranded there after the attack on Pearl Harbor. She responded to pressure from coerced Allied service members to help them with their propaganda broadcasts, providing a female voice. According to many accounts, Toguri did her work unwillingly and did what she could to provide support to the prisoners-of-war. After the war she was arrested and spent a year in jail before being released due to lack of evidence of wrongdoing. She was then transported to the US, where she stood trial on eight counts of treason. After a long and expensive trial she was found guilty on one count and served over six years in prison. In 1977, President Gerald Ford granted her a full and unconditional pardon.

12 Boxer Laila : ALI

Laila Ali is the daughter of the great Muhammad Ali and is a very capable boxer in her own right. Laila’s professional record is an impressive 24 wins, including 21 knockouts. Now retired, she never lost a fight, and nor did she ever draw. One of those victories was against Jackie Frazier-Lyde, daughter of her father’s nemesis Joe Frazier. Laila is not a bad dancer either, coming in third place in the fourth season of “Dancing with the Stars”.

18 “Size matters not” Jedi master : YODA

Yoda is one of the most beloved characters of the “Star Wars” series of films. Yoda’s voice is provided by the great modern-day puppeteer Frank Oz of “Muppets” fame.

29 Part of a Park Ave. address : NY, NY

Park Avenue in New York City used to be known as Fourth Avenue, and for much of its length carried the tracks of the New York and Harlem Railroad. When the line was built, some of it was constructed by cutting through the length of the street and then forming underground tunnels by covering over the line with grates and greenery. This greenery formed a parkland between 34th and 40th Streets, and in 1860 the grassy section of Fourth Avenue was renamed Park Avenue, a name that was eventually used for the whole thoroughfare.

31 Japanese seaport : OTARU

The Japanese city and port of Otaru is just a 25-minute drive northwest from Sapporo. Just like Sapporo, Otaru has a famous beer that shares the city’s name.

32 Group often threatened in dystopian fiction : HUMAN RACE

A dystopia is an imaginary community in which the residents live unhappily and in fear. “Dystopia” is the opposite of “utopia”. One example of such a society is that described by George Orwell in “Nineteen Eighty-Four”. A more contemporary example would be the setting for the novels “The Hunger Games”.

34 Quran reader : IMAM

An imam is a Muslim leader, and often the person in charge of a mosque or perhaps a Muslim community.

36 Peace Nobelist Root : ELIHU

Elihu Root was an American statesman, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize in 1912 for his diplomatic work that brought “nations together through arbitration and cooperation”. Root served as Secretary of State under President Theodore Roosevelt.

37 43,560 square feet : ACRE

At one time, an acre was defined as the amount of land a yoke of oxen could plow in a day. Then, an acre was more precisely defined as a strip of land “one furrow long” (i.e. one furlong) and one chain wide. The length of one furlong was equal to 10 chains, or 40 rods. A area of one furlong times 10 rods was one rood.

49 Wispy clouds : CIRRI

Cirrus (plural “cirri”) clouds are those lovely wispy, white strands that are often called “mare’s tails”.

51 “This I Promise You” band : NSYNC

“This I Promise You” was a hit for boy band NSYNC in 2000. The group recorded a version of the song in Spanish at the same time, “Yo te Voy a Amar”, and released it in Spanish-speaking countries all over the world.

54 IM VIP : BFF

In the world of IMs (instant messages), a BFF (best friend forever) is a VIP (very important person).

57 Lao Tzu’s “way” : TAO

Lao Tse (also “Lao-Tzu”) was a central figure in the development of the religion/philosophy of Taoism. Tradition holds that Lao-Tzu wrote the “Tao Te Ching”, a classical Chinese text that is fundamental to the philosophy of Taoism.

58 Brian of ambient music : ENO

Brian Eno was one of the pioneers of the ambient genre of music. Eno composed an album in 1978 called “Ambient 1: Music for Airports”, which was the first in a series of four albums with an ambient theme. Eno named the tracks, somewhat inventively, 1/1, 2/1, 2/1 and 2/2.